


Your Body Is Not A Word

by 75hearts



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: (relatedly there are lots of themes/references to addiction and disordered eating stuff), Canon Asexual Character, Creeper Elias Bouchard, Dubious Consent, Extremely Dubious Consent, Self-Destructive Choices, Self-Hatred, Statement Addiction, Statement withdrawal, aka: in which jonathan sims has sex to fuel his statement addiction, hunger
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-28
Updated: 2019-11-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:15:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,853
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21588235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/75hearts/pseuds/75hearts
Summary: He’s not supposed to pull them out of people. But — people tell their friends about the Magnus Institute all the time, encourage them to make a statement. And so he can do that, too. Right? As long as he doesn’t compel the man, he’s not doing anything worse than that. If anything, they’ll get a better deal from him than they would from well-meaning friends; he’s willing to give them something in exchange.
Comments: 15
Kudos: 132





	Your Body Is Not A Word

It’s been too long since he’s eaten.

 _It would be so easy_ , his mind sing-songs, and even if he didn’t know that it was true from experience the Knowledge settling in his mind more unchangeably than gravity would banish any doubt. He could walk outside, greedy eyes and gaunt face, skin stretched painfully over muscle and tendon and bone, and he could find someone and just -- ask. All he would have to do is ask, and then it would be over, and he could shiver back into himself, the gnawing hunger retreating like morning mist in the sunlight, and he would be able to _think_ again.

As it is, this is the only thing he can think of, and it hurts.

 _But_. He remembers Basira’s face. All of their faces. It’s unsettling, drifting over his skin and itching uncomfortably. Would he be taking over the minds of innocent people, or does he merely control their body? Or is there a difference? The brain is just another piece of meat, after all, electrified and sloshing inside a cage of bone. 

Either way, he’ll be haunting their nightmares for the rest of their life. Or his, maybe, if that ends sooner than theirs. He hasn’t asked whether Gertrude’s living victims still dream of her. He doesn’t particularly want to know. (Or does he? If he met one of them, would he relax into their words and lean in, savoring each syllable, using all his energy to restrain himself from begging for more?)

The streets are cold at night; he lights a cigarette. Starving ( _t_ _o death? is this just his own form of protracted suicide?_ ) with nothing but willpower on his side is fucking _hard_. He doesn’t have to struggle to imagine Daisy, surrounded by food and water, refusing to eat or drink until she collapses on the spot. He’s pretty sure that _he’d_ break by the third day. 

He’s already gone longer than three days, he tells himself. Subsisting on the stale scraps of old statements. They’re not enough. 

A man crosses the street, and Jon Knows that the man has a statement inside him. 

He’s not supposed to pull them out of people. But — people tell their friends about the Magnus Institute all the time, encourage them to make a statement. And so he can do that, too. Right? As long as he doesn’t _compel_ the man, he’s not doing anything worse than that. It’s not like the man would be making an informed statement, but then, nobody does, save the other employees. If anything, they’ll get a better deal from him than they would from well-meaning friends; he’s willing to give them something in exchange. The Institute always refused to pay for statements, but the idea of protecting the institute’s integrity is _laughable_ at this point. He already knows it won’t matter what they want in return. He’s desperate — Trevor Herbert’s statement springs to mind almost immediately, his shaky handwriting talking of the Hunt as an addiction. _Of the two, I have always found heroin the easier one to quit._ Is that what Jon is? Just another pathetic addict on the streets of London, promising to do anything to get their next fix? He decides, as he smashes his cigarette into an ashtray, that he doesn’t particularly care. He’s already started following the man. It’s better that he do this now, he tells himself, because if he lets himself get any hungrier he might not be able to back off if the man says no. That should be an argument for locking himself in his room and barricading his door, and he knows it, but — well —

He Knows, before he even taps the man’s shoulder, what the man will respond best to, and his stomach drops through the pavement, a hiss of breath escaping from between his gritted teeth. 

Well. It’s hardly the worst thing he’s done for this job. And it won’t hurt anyone else, which is what matters. Which is the only thing that matters.

Jon brushes the hair back from his face, tries to stand up straighter, and wishes that the bags under his eyes weren’t so dark. Maybe the shadows will hide it. Not that they’ll be able to do anything about how gaunt he is, but — well. If he’s lucky, he’ll get to keep all his clothes on, just use his tongue, and the man won’t have to see the rest of him, won’t have to notice that he can count Jon’s ribs or that the count is two fewer than it should be. 

Then again, it’s not often that the Archivist gets _lucky_ , these days. 

It’s easier than he expects, to make himself pretty for the man. To _flirt_. God, it stings, and there is something inside him that aches to end this dance and just _pull the damn story out of him_ and _leave_. But he knows he can’t, he knows he promised, even this is toeing the line, and so he grits his teeth and _bats his fucking eyelashes._ He knows he must look ridiculous like this, but it doesn’t matter, he’s so incredibly _hungry_ and maybe if he does this well enough --

The man’s flat is small and sparse; the floor is cold, Jon can feel it through his trousers as he kneels, hands pawing at the man’s belt. The man laughs, tousles his hair with a callused hand. “You’re a needy little slut, aren’t you?” he says, and it’s all Jon can do not to throw up. The worst part is that he’s not even _wrong_.

Jon doesn’t throw up as the man reaches down under his shirt, tugging it off, letting it fall to the floor. Instead, he closes his eyes and leans forward, opening his mouth. It shouldn’t surprise him that the taste is that of warm skin, but somehow it does; he had expected it to taste different, somehow. He gags anyway, but instead of pulling back he pushes himself down further. It doesn’t hurt, it isn’t worms burrowing into his skin or the skin of his hand blistering, he shouldn’t be gagging, shouldn’t be feeling like he wants to crawl out of his skin. The other man is even enjoying himself. If the worst thing that happens here is that a monster gets a little uncomfortable, that’s _fine_. It’s not like he didn’t sign up for exactly this. He keeps reminding himself of that, over and over, as he begins, clumsily, to suck and lick. After a minute he remembers to moan, to flutter his eyelids a little.

The man’s cum tastes uncomfortably alkaline, bitter and slippery and salty, and Jon spits before he can stop himself, wiping at his lips before looking back up. The desperate hunger in his eyes hasn’t gone away, but there is something else in them now, too, the greedy light of hopeful anticipation.

The man doesn’t give him a statement. It takes every ounce of his strength to walk out the door. He considers promising to himself that he’ll never do it again, but he already knows it would be a lie.

He lays back and opens his legs, for the next one. No point in holding onto his dignity any longer; better to get used to it, get it over with. Jon goes home sore but his eyes are alight, relief written into the lines of his face. He’s shaking like a leaf but his voice is strong and he can _think_ again, no longer overcome with the sensation of being hollowed out, the feeling of gradually growing less as his body cannibalizes itself for fuel. He feels _strong_ and he tries not to think about how he’ll be seeing all their faces in their nightmares. It’s not as though he’s the victim. He can imagine how they might tell the story: the frenetic man with strange eyes, who pretended at compassion and attraction, who pried their story out with gentle hands on hot skin, who fell out of their life only to watch whenever they closed their eyes. It’s an unpleasant picture of him, but not an untrue one. It would be easier if it wasn’t so _good,_ if it didn’t feel like electricity sparkling in his marrow, if he could honestly say he didn’t like it. It’s funny; for all that he has to fake his gasps of pleasure when he offers himself up, he can barely swallow them when the words start coming out. He thinks, still half-delirious, brain light with ecstasy, of the multiple meanings of the word _climax._

It becomes part of his schedule without any particular conscious intent. He doesn’t tell the others. He’s not sure if it’s because he’s slipping into evil and hiding the evidence again or if he’s just humiliated at the thought of them seeing. A thrill of fear runs through him whenever he imagines them finding out, and he slams the door bitterly at the thought of how _delicious_ the Eye must find _that_. His dark circles lighten, his heart relearns how to beat at a normal pace, he stops getting dizzy when he stands up too fast. He starts carrying around condoms, learns to fake noises of pleasure. He listens to a woman talking about being trapped in a shark diving cage, running slowly out of oxygen underwater, and adds it quietly to his notes on the Buried. He sleeps as little as he can get away with. He tries to pay attention, always, for the quiet whirr of a tape recorder.

Even when he’s alone, he feels a thousand eyes on him. Watching him. Maybe especially when he’s alone. He cries sometimes, when he’s certain nobody except the Eye can hear him, and the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. The sudden, horrifying realization of _who exactly the Eye is using to watch him_ sweeps over him, and it’s all he can do to reach the bathroom before he’s retching, cum and bile rising to his mouth from his otherwise-empty stomach.

The cold tile floor of the bathroom holds him for almost an hour before he gathers enough strength to remind himself that he’s _fine_. He chose this, every step of the way, and he’s not starving anymore, and he doesn’t have time to sit around feeling sorry for himself because of the consequences of what are, he reminds himself, _his own choices_. There are more important things he needs to be focused on, and the entire point of doing this instead of starving to death was (because he’s a coward, because Daisy is both a murderer and a better person than him) so that he could think about other things. If Elias has been watching him — well. It’s not like he can do anything about that now, and it’s not like it’ll change anything.

He stands up, splashes water on his face, takes a deep breath, and walks out. His teeth are gritted and his eyes shy away from strangers whenever he’s not manic enough that they light up with the intensity of a predator stalking its prey and he is _perfectly fine_.


End file.
